Design Works International is truly an international design studio with extremely talented artists contributing work from literally all over the world. We believe this mix of culture, talent and creativity is one of the reasons that make us the go-to Lifestyle Studio.

Stan Hywet Hall & Gardens a 70 acre country estate, with gardens, located at 714 North Portage Path in Akron, Ohio. It is currently the 6th largest home in the U.S., and the largest in Ohio on the list of largest houses in the United States.

When there was need to restore tapestry in this amazing home, the organization came to us. Design Works International recreated the textile print and First2Print printed the fabric. The project was quite challenging as the design was being printed on a tinted fabric and there was a texture that needed to be recreated to simulate the original fabric. Our artists were up to the tasks and the finished product came out beautiful.

It is a tapestry from the Byzantine Era and is over 1100 years old!! It is one of only two examples in the world today. Obviously it is severely damaged. What they wanted to do was recreate a piece, digitally, so the viewer could understand the complete design.

They also had scans of the one other fragment and we were tasked with combining them so that First2Print could print a piece on fabric for display in the museum.

Here is our finished piece. The other fragments coloration was different so we had to adjust the two to work together and we filled in some areas on one side with pieces from the opposite.

We are proud to share an update from our sister company, First2print, about and exciting project that they participated in with Christian Siriano. Originally posted here.

The Social Imprint project used viewer tweets to inform an algorithm, which produced a graphic print design, which was digitally printed on silk charmeuse at our NY Studio, and finally was shipped to Christian Siriano who created two garments from it. This project meshed together technology, real-time social response to pop culture and fashion, and was worth the late nights preparing for a seamless production that ran parallel to Fashion Rocks at the Barclay Center. The final garments were walked down a runway at the Gilded Lilly in NYC, which representatives from First2Print were invited to attend.

It’s a great quote and it is something we at Design Works believe in and think about on a daily basis. Paul Rand was an American art director and graphic designer. He is best known for his corporate logo designs, which include IBM, UPS, ABC and Steve Job’s NeXT, to name a few. His posters and book covers are some of the most recognizable graphic design in the world and we see them every day. He was one of the first American designers to embrace and practice the Swiss style of graphic design. The Swiss style or International Typographic Style emphasizes cleanliness, objectivity and readability. Always a very important approach to design. It’s more difficult to think minimally than over fill the space to distract the viewers eye.

The Museum of the City of New York is hosting an exhibition of Paul Rand works; “Everything is Design: The Work of Paul Rand” through July 19th. The exhibit features more than 150 advertisements, posters, corporate brochures by Mr. Rand. Click here for more information.

Paul Rand is a great influence as he was tasked with similar issues that we deal with on a daily basis. He was a problem solver, but was able to create beautiful designs without unnecessary busyness. Here are a few examples of his work. We’ve also added a few pieces to our Pinterest board .